The Power Of The Petard Need Not Affect You

The domain of man is limited to the mindset that is developed from within. Some merely live for self-aggrandizement, while others swim with pleasure in the pool of the fleshly delights. Yes, each to their own. Only, each one of us is affected in some way by another’s obsessions and out-of-control lusts. This is especially so, if the other has influence beyond merely wanting to be our best friend.

This may be a philosophical matter, even though many do not see the providence of humankind a matter of health. Needless to say, health is critical for everything. Unhealthy climates can be more than physical and particular to the individual. What appears to be an unhealthy climate or state of mind for one person, might be the very reason another survives and finds a purpose for existence. Ultimately, we are the ones who find comfort in our suffering or feel the need to hyperventilate our feelings with expressions of anger and disappointment. Tragically, this is territory belonging to the non-physical realm that is all too common, and Utopian alternatives seem so otherworldly that we may not bother to acknowledge the percolating discontent within our very core, even though we desire a better deal. Let’s face it, we all have a bitch about something, at sometime. The question is, Why do we feel the need? And, more to the point, Is it healthy?

A timely cathartic outburst might relieve the tension under the skin, but wantonness is not something we freely admit too. Truth be known, we are all longing something, only our inhibitions constrain us from rocking the boat, least whatever creature comforts we enjoy are snatched away from some callous cretin who doesn’t understand or care about our true psychological sensitivities. All we really want is to love and be loved. The difficulty with this oft worn phrase of longing to be loved and to love lies in its interpretation. We could just as well say, “One person’s poison is another person’s pleasure.” For what disgusts some as being morally repugnant, a less principled person finds relief from some primordial desire that has been caged because of circumstances outside of his or her control. At least this is forms the basis for mitigating circumstances that permit judges to justify forgoing imposing a penalty appropriate to the crimes committed by the those who break free from the inner torment of their cage. If only, we had a healthier society, then leisure might become the pleasure we desire to indulge twenty-four seven. Love might be interpreted as a form of appreciation of each one’s true worth and justice may be based upon true righteousness, rather than goal posts of injustice that shift at the whim of some petard.

Our mindsets are determined by different factors. We may wonder why some people seem to have a healthy mindset, and others unhealthy, yet appear to be the norm. How often have violent outbursts of frustration been evidenced among communities where peace and tranquility are foreign? For many simply a word is sufficient for the onset of the apocalypse. Often just one word classified as sexist or racist or discriminatory is sufficient to consign an innocent child to the gallows, but not one that is rude, lewd or crude from those who are politically correct. Wanton for something meaningful, abuse abounds the halls of power; whether that power is in government or at work or at school or in the church or the kitchen or the bedroom; it is still abuse. The domain of our personal power is found in our inner self. Whether the inner self is a healthy domain of beauty and wonderment and positive affirmations of goodness has nothing to do with external factors, rather it has more to do with soundness of each one’s mindset. We might be affected by outside influences, but we need not let them rule our mind. A sound mind is set when we take control of our thoughts and determine the direction we will take in life, whether we will suffer in silence, protest in outrage or enjoy good health in our body, mind and soul.

A healthier you, means a healthier society. A healthier you also means a wealthier and wiser you. And this has nothing to do with rams, lambs and ewes. Whatever the sacrifice imagined, it is all about YOU

www.happyriches.com

You Are Amazing And So Say All Of Us

July 3rd 2013 12:02

Link: happyriches.com

What amazing creatures we are. Whether you believe we are a biological entity that has evolved from thousands of chaotic mutations that—against all possibility—have overturned all the mathematical odds of reason and managed to foster and maintain complex systems of reliability and conformity, or whether you are a creationist who believes in intelligent design, the fact remains: humans are amazing creatures.

One of the reasons we are amazing creatures is that, like all biological forms of life, we can demonstrate metabolic growth, reproduce, respond to different circumstances within our environment and make the necessary adaptions required for our survival in a world fraught with danger and destruction. This is what happens, even while we are maturing: in order to maintain a state of homeostasis within our environment, an internal genetically coded mechanism that is of a biological nature has to adjust physiologically to environmental stimuli day in, day out. This may mean that at the cellular level there is much going on of which we are not aware, except, as is usually the case, in the event of a malfunction, that is, an illness.

Somehow, our genetic makeup has enabled us to maintain our humanity as we know it, distinguishable from other creatures and life forms on this planet. This does not appear to be a consequence of random happenings, rather from a continuation of a designated formula that appears to be imprinted within our genes, which, at this point of time, we assume are the governing forces that predetermine our gender, height, eye color, skin complexion and hair and body type. These six dissimilitude’s play a major factor in determining our physical appearance, but are not conclusive in having the final say. Diet and activity and lifestyle choices also have a major impact upon our bodily appearance and, when the truth is known, rule the day.

Our diet can be one that affects our natural physiology in numerous ways. This is evident when short people from countries that have low protein diets immigrate to countries where protein is freely available and their children are naturally taller. The effects of diet is also evident in photos taken of people in United States during the years prior to the Second World War, where members of the general populace appear more gaunt in their faces than those in photos taken at random from the years since the 1960s. Obesity is much more evident in the post war photos of the general population than it was prior to the World War II. The major difference between the generations is the diet consumed and activities played.

Activity, from an overall perspective, has dramatically decreased proportionately to the number of children who watch television or play computer games. Sedentary activity—if you can call it activity—plays a major part of people’s lives in the western countries or other affluent societies than what it does in communities where the need for every person to scratch a living from whatever means possible is paramount. Consequently, there are more obese individuals found among the affluent than there are within the non-affluent. Although, this does have qualifications, because the poorer members of the affluent societies tend to be home to more obese individuals than the wealthy members of affluent society. Unfortunately, the poorer members of the affluent society are often derogatorily referred to as the effluent society, or white trash, rather than the affluent society. Whether this is because of a lower standard of education, a tendency towards obesity, a lack of morality and lower living standards in general, you can be the judge.

Lifestyle choices do play an important part in our appearance regardless of gender, height, eye color, skin complexion, hair type and physique. Not everybody is born tall or short or thin or fat or muscular. Eye color can vary from being black or brown or blue or green or yellow to pink. Skin complexion, regardless of the amount of melanin that is present in the skin, can be dry or oily. Irrespective of color, hair can be kinky or straight, regardless of where it grows on the body; it can also be frizzy, curly or wavy, long or short. Physique, likewise, is not restricted to genetics, because those who eat and do not exercise will put on weight, while those who do not eat will lose weight. The middle road is to exercise and put on muscle—how much is a matter of choice but restricted by genetic parameters. An ectomorphic individual will not look like Arnold Schwarzenegger in the Terminator, no matter how hard he tries, and an endomorphic individual is pushing more than turf uphill if he fantasizes becoming an ectomorph and living a healthy life.

Overall, what we eat, and what we do, and the lifestyle choices that we determine will affect our appearance. Sadly, to say, our interpretation of the image in the mirror on the wall does not have the final say. Death reigns on the last day. Life on planet Earth is but the blossoming of a flower that sends out its fragrance to attract the bee to continue episodes of activity, which we will never see in our biological form. Pass on we must, regardless of all the fuss. Just as the book says: on we go, dust to dust.

Surely, there has to be more!

Howl The Beautiful Angel Groans

Howl The Beautiful Angel Groans

July 2nd 2013 05:48

Link: happyriches.com

When thinking about health, most of us immediately think of being fit and looking fantastic. This is what health is supposed to be. It is like a house. When we see a house, we see the outside. The outside is how we judge the occupants. A good looking house that is well kept must have owners who care for it. This is how we think. If the house is magnificent in its appearance, our natural instinct is to admire the owners. Likewise, our bodies are the same.

However, our bodies can be marred by different defects. Some of us have skin conditions that prevent us from looking as good as we might like to look. Some of us will have warts and moles that appear in the wrong places like on the top our nose and the tip of our chin. One mole placed on the upper cheek is called a beauty spot; a hundred moles are called a curse.

Some of us will have to shave when we wanted to be feminine and others of us will find that being masculine means having to shave three times a day, so it is easier to grow a beard. Some of us grow a beard to hide our acne.Those that shave only once a week hate the fact that every budding zit gets nicked and we look more like we have been attacked by a cat, so we start shaving every day, and wish we had not started.

Some of us suffer from deformities as a result of accidents. Some of us suffer deformities as a result of birth, which leaves us wondering who was on strike when the doctor was called, and why wasn’t our angel on duty.

Some of us have genetically predisposed conditions that prevent us from obtaining that golden bronze tan. Some of us are black. Some of us are brown. Some of us are heavily freckled with what appear to be orange spots. Some of us end up being like cooked lobsters after having been in the sun. Some of us will have suffered sunstroke and know what it is to wake up in the middle of a hot night shivering and wondering who threw us in the freezer.

Body beautiful is not just an industry, for most of us it is a way of life. And it is not a modern phenomenon. Throughout the ages, a body needed to be beautiful. If it wasn’t beautiful; it was adorned to make it look beautiful. This why Papuans wear long wooden shafts on their penises; why certain tribes in Africa and Asia placed rings around girls ‘necks to stretch them and plates are used to stretch lips, and the Chinese mangled women’s feet. This is also why people have made masks and adorned themselves with the furs of animals and feathers of birds. This is why people have painted and tattooed themselves throughout the centuries. This innate desire to mask our inner feelings of inadequacy so that we might look better on the outside, regardless of how hideous we might look appears to be a need for not just us living today but also many of our ancestors..

Beauty might be in the eyes of the beholder, good health is the result of what goes on inside the body, beautiful or not. We all like to be beautiful. We will find that we are in the eyes of at least one other, if not everyone. This beauty is not necessarily found with creams, potions, mascara or eyeliner; nor is it found with pins, piercings, rings, scars and tattoos. It is found in a healthy mind, body and soul.

10 Benefits Of Prayer

Religious beliefs and activities can have a profound impact on our mental and physical well being by reducing stress, improving resistance to diseases, enhancing memory and mental function, and helping us to lead longer lives.—Andrew Newberg is a founder of neurotheology, the study of the relationship between spiritual phenomena and the human brain.


Some people are sick and have pain, and it gets the best of them. Not me. Praying eases the pain. Sometimes I pray when I am in deep, serious pain; I pray, and all at once the pain gets easy.”
Those are the words of an 83-year-old woman (called “Mrs. A” to maintain confidentiality),
published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, where doctors marveled at her amazing
resilience.

Mrs. A suffered from goiter, arthritis, diabetes, and a rare type of nerve damage, possibly
that triggered pain all over her body and weakness in her legs. Medications, acupuncture, and massage brought no relief yet she lived alone, without assistance from a homemaker or nurse, and
remained in good spirits.

As well as taking care of herself, Mrs. A regularly attended church services and prayer groups, and
helped others in charitable work with the sick. She boggled her doctors’ minds.
In the journal article, one of them wrote:“She is a very impressive patient in that, throughout the 15 years that I have known her, she has continued to live with a chronic, progressive,
and debilitating illness and has done so with incredible spirit, particularly in light of the lack of traditional medicine to offer her a lot of hope. She relies on her belief in God and her own prayers to
get her through some really tough times.”

What Scientists Don’t Understand While Mrs. A’s doctors recognized the power of her religious beliefs, they were left with more questions than answers about how religion affects health. Other scientists have tried to find some answers through research.

One type of study has examined intercessionary prayer — the prayers of strangers at a distance — to
see whether these influence the subjects of the prayer, people who are suffering from some type of
illness. There is no direct contact between these individuals and the ill people have no knowledge of the prayers for their welfare.

To test the outcome, researchers have also observed another, similar group of ill people for whom
prayers are not being said (a “control group”), and compared changes in health to see if prayer had an impact. Some of these studies have found that those for whom prayers were said fared better, while others have not, but that doesn’t mean prayer doesn’t help people. Ultimately, this type of research is flawed, according to Wendy Cadge, Ph.D., a sociologist and associate professor at Brandeis University in Boston who studies the role of religion in healthcare.

“Prayer happens for all kinds of people all the time, even though many of us don’t know we’re being prayed for,” she says. “And in lots of religious organizations, there are prayers for groups of people.”

In other words, scientists’ assumptions that no one is praying for people in a control group are unrealistic and impossible to confirm. “Scientists tried their best to study something that may be beyond their best tools,” says Cadge. Perhaps more important, she says, is the fact that there is no need for
science to validate religious beliefs.


Many studies have looked at how health and well-being are influenced by having spiritual beliefs, praying, and attending religious services, and these have found a wide range of benefits.

1) Becoming More Forgiving
Two studies at Florida State University found that praying for a person
increases your ability to forgive that person. In one study, people who prayed
for a romantic partner harbored fewer vengeful thoughts and emotions and
were more ready to forgive and move on after a conflict.
In another study, men and women prayed for the well-being of a close
friend, daily for four weeks, while others simply thought positive thoughts
about their friend. Those who prayed were more willing to forgive, not only
the friend but other people in general. Forgiveness is associated with better
overall health and satisfaction with life.
source: Psychological Science

2) Achieving Goals More Effectively
Researchers at the University of Miami analyzed more than eight
decades of research and found that prayer and other religious practices
improve the ability to pursue and achieve long-term goals. Prayer affects
regions of the brain that improve self-control, and people who view their
goals as sacred put more effort and energy into attaining them.
source: Psychological Bulletin

3) Living a Longer Life
Numerous studies have found that people who are religious are likely to
live a longer life. For example, an analysis of 42 studies with a total of more
than 125,000 people found that in addition to private prayer, attending
religious services, and being involved in other church activities predicted a
longer and healthier lifespan.
source: Health Psychology

4) Coping Better With Breast Cancer
Praying in an online support group helped breast cancer patients
experience less stress, have lower levels of negative emotions, and experience
greater well-being, according to a study of 97 patients at the University
of Wisconsin-Madison Center of Excellence in Cancer Communications
Research. In addition, belief in an afterlife reduced fear of death.
source: PsychoOncology

5) Protecting Teens Against Drugs
Teens who view religion as a meaningful part of their lives are half as
likely to use drugs, compared to non-religious teens — especially during
stressful times, such as having an unemployed parent. So concluded
researchers at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, who studied 1,182
adolescents in grades 7 through 10.
source: Psychology of Addictive Behaviors

6) Recovering From Abusive Relationships
Prayer helps victims of abusive relationships to recover a positive view
of themselves and reduces emotional pain, according to in-depth interviews
with dozens of abuse victims by a sociologist at the University of Wisconsin-
Madison. In addition, people who are religious are less likely to suffer
from post-traumatic stress disorder after being victims of violence in a
relationship.
source: Social Psychology Quarterly

7) Reducing Financial Strain
A study of more than 800 older people found that faith and attendance
at religious services offset the emotional toll of financial strain. Researchers
at the University of Michigan found that prayer increases gratitude which, in
turn, reduces the negative impact of financial difficulties.
source: The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion

8) Reducing Genetic Risk for Depression
Adults with the highest risk of depression, due to a family history of
the condition, are one-tenth as likely to suffer from depression if religion
is important in their lives and they frequently attend religious services,
according to a study at Columbia University. Those who are religious
and at lower risk of depression are at least one-fourth as likely to develop
depression as their non-religious peers.
Numerous other studies show that prayer and other religious practices
reduce or alleviate depression, with or without genetic risk.
source: The American Journal of Psychiatry

9) Increasing Happiness and Financial Satisfaction
A University of South Florida study of 1,413 adults found that those who
are the most religious, in terms of prayer with a positive focus, attendance at
church services, and using their faith to deal with day-to-day problems in a
positive way, are happier and more satisfied with their financial situation.
source: Journal of Religion and Health

10) Improving Recovery From Heart Surgery
People who pray with a positive, hopeful attitude as an ongoing part
of their lives prior to undergoing heart surgery, experience less depression
and anxiety afterwards, both in the short and long term, according to studies
at the University of Washington Health Sciences and the University of
Pittsburgh. However, those who pray only after surgery or take a negative
view do not experience the same benefits.
Another study, at the University of Michigan, tracked 151 patients for a
year and found that private prayer significantly improved mood and overall
state of being.
source: The Gerontologist


www.tencommandmentstoday.com

A Healthier You

A Healthier You

Health is a big topic, but really only as big as our interest in our own health. Size has nothing to do with it. Ego may be another matter. But not an ego that is out of control. A healthy ego that is a good thing. It is important for good health. The same as a sound mindset is essential for good health, especially since health is more than just a purely physical phenomenon.

There are many approaches to maintaining good health. Since these approaches are centered on maintaining good health, they are all valid. However, not every approach has the same effectiveness in maintaining optimum health. Once we understand that it is for our benefit to maintain optimal health, we also realize that we alone are responsible for our health. Unfortunately, the unenlightened seem to think it is the domain of other people or institutions. The truth is the government or its advisory arms, societies and funds and organizations dedicated to health, pharmaceutical companies and health professionals, are not responsible for a person's health. Once a child is no longer in the care of its parents or caregiver, having grown old enough, the child is responsible for his or her own health.

What all this means, if we are to have good health insurance, is you and I are responsible for maintaining our own health. And why not? We owe it to nobody else other than ourselves to have a good health plan. But then if we have children, we owe it to them to maintain good health for ourselves. Also we need to teach them good health, if not by instruction, at least by example. Good health insurance is to have a good health plan that does not cost very much money and can be eaten at home.

My experience is that children tend to copy rather than process information and then work out what it means. Copying parents is easier. Although, copying their friends bad habits can seem to be more fun. Nonetheless, when children see their parents are healthier than their friend’s parents, they are more likely to have their own epiphany regarding the value of maintaining good health. Not only does maintaining good health mean you can have more fun, it also means you are able to save more money, which means you have more money to spend or invest, and, if you are feeling charitable, you can help the impoverished.

Food is fun. Good health means even more fun. Healthy options are about making the most of what life has to offer you. What this means is your whole body, soul and mind all contribute to a healthier you. This is a healthier, wealthier and wiser YOU.

Link: happyriches.com